CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar

[TribbleTrouble1]

Please forgive me but .......if they are being represented pro bono.......why does he need more money?

Pro bono simply means that the attorneys are waving their hourly fees (which would be considerable), but there are still plenty of hard and third-party costs associated with the litigation that they will have to pay. Does anybody think Alec/Robert/Terry are going to be paying those out of their own pockets out of their love and commitment to the project?

 

[muCephi]

But, you are operating from the premise that it is the writers themselves who are at fault for the formulaic feel. All productions get network notes. Most of them are going to follow those notes. Very very very few shows can do whatever they want. CBS is not one of those networks that will allow one of their major brands to just do whatever some Nebula winner writes. It's a risk that I doubt they would take.

I was saying what I'd like to see, so that I guess its outside what the studio would want. but points taken IRL :-)

 

[Albinator]

And if that's the case, it'll lose me. Sorry. I don't want same old, same old. We got that for 18 years with little variation. Give me something fresh and new.

See ya!

But seriously, i don't want stale same old/same old, but I don't want a total reinvention. It should still be familiar, but with a new edge.

If you want them to totally reinvent Star Trek, why bother? Justwatch a different sci-fi series. There's that new one with Thomas Jane, go watch that.

 

[Jon1701]

I am not looking for them to reinvent Star Trek. I'm happy with the way TNG re-invigorated TOS, introduced some new ideas (communicators on insignia, replicators, holodecks) but think they should keep it fairly familiar as well. Departing too much wouldn't make it Star Trek.

Remember, the reason they're doing this is to attract the audience that KNOWS Star Trek. Audiences by and large desire the familiar. Because new and different frightens them.

I'm pretty sure they are trying to attract an audience that doesn't know Star Trek. People stopped watching it last time so they cancelled it.

If they try and copy what went before we are fucked. Also (to try and keep it on topic) I'll bet my mortgage it wont look anything like Axanar and those guys in particular will try and burn CBS to the ground.

Wipe the slate clean.

 

[Mudd]

Yeah, I doubt they're going after the existing trekkie audience. There's no future there.

 

[urbandefault]

Pro bono simply means that the attorneys are waving their hourly fees (which would be considerable), but there are still plenty of hard and third-party costs associated with the litigation that they will have to pay. Does anybody think Alec/Robert/Terry are going to be paying those out of their own pockets out of their love and commitment to the project?

Not from anything we've seen so far.

What I'd really like to see is the discussion of the next series/movies take place in the appropriate topics. That's not too much to ask, is it?

 

[Trekkin]

See ya!

But seriously, i don't want stale same old/same old, but I don't want a total reinvention. It should still be familiar, but with a new edge.

If you want them to totally reinvent Star Trek, why bother? Justwatch a different sci-fi series. There's that new one with Thomas Jane, go watch that.

For all the shit we give the first few seasons for not being near as innovative as it thought it was, TNG and its sequels were a reinvention. New characters, new ship, in a setting with major changes to what we'd seen before (Klingons as crew members?.) If they go back to it, it will be another reinvention for all the viewers who might check the series out based on the films.

I can't speak for anyone else, but for me TNG isn't 'Trek.' I don't mean that the way the phrase is typically used, just that it doesn't define the franchise for me. It's part of a ever-growing whole, and that 'growth' will inevitably mean change.

 

[Albinator]

I'm pretty sure they are trying to attract an audience that doesn't know Star Trek

I can guarantee you that you are 100% wrong. They are counting on the Star Trek name and the things that people know about Star Trek, whether they're fans or not. It's why the JJ reboot was on the Enterprise, with Kirk and Spock and Khan and Klingons and Tribbles and phasers and communicators and transporters. It's public consciousness. They're not reinventing it.

They may not be aiming at us Trekkies, and they will certainly freshen it up to attract a newer audience, but they need both new audiences AND us Trekkies to show up, so I highly doubt they'll depart too far from what people recognize as Star Trek.

 

[Albinator]

For all the shit we give the first few seasons for not being near as innovative as it thought it was, TNG and its sequels were a reinvention. New characters, new ship, in a setting with major changes to what we'd seen before (Klingons as crew members?.) If they go back to it, it will be another reinvention for all the viewers who might check the series out based on the films.

No disagreement, but I don't call that a reinvention.

I can't speak for anyone else, but for me TNG isn't 'Trek.'

TNG is Star Trek to me.

It's part of a ever-growing whole, and that 'growth' will inevitably mean change.

Change is fine. Complete reinvention is not. It's why I can enjoy the JJ films. They're still Star Trek, just a different flavor.

But what the original poster I responded to wanted was a total ground-up reinvention.

 

[Professor Zoom]

I was saying what I'd like to see, so that I guess its outside what the studio would want. but points taken IRL :-)

I'm not saying I wouldn't want to see it. I would love to see each authors take on Star Trek. Like I would love to see a different directors take on it. How each episode could be radically different than the next. In tone. In focus.

It would be a fascinating experience. But. It'll never happen.

 

[CaptGrumpy]

Please forgive me but .......if they are being represented pro bono.......why does he need more money?

For the same reason God needs a starship?

 

[Mudd]

https://znculturecast.wordpress.com/tag/alec-peters/

[Alec Peters] created a Kickstarter and raised about $650K in 2014. Earlier this year, he started an Indigogo asking for 1.4 million. He claimed that the earlier Kickstarter was used to building “Ares Studios” – a production workhouse to make the fan film.

This is where things start to get fishy. Beyond just seemingly misusing the funds from the earlier Kickstarter, it started to get out that there were multiple problems in the production of the actual film with Peters in charge. In addition, word got out that Peters and his girlfriend were getting salaries from their work on the Axanar. This is likely what caught CBS and Paramount’s attention. As a producer, getting a salary generating a profit – that’s a huge no-no.

Not to mention that the studio that he built was also planned to make other for-profit ventures. Fine in and of itself, but when you used copyrighted material to help get funds for it, it presents a legal problem.

So, CBS/Paramount filed a lawsuit for copyright violations. Since lawsuits take time to develop before filing, their legal teams likely were building enough of a case for some time and have enough to feel that they not only had a case, but one that could be won.

Since that time, the reaction online has been hilarious and sad. From what I have seen at sites such as Trek Today and TrekMovie (but, oddly enough, not at the TrekBBS), fans who were supportive of Axanar have decried CBS/Paramount saying they are declaring war on “fan culture” (whatever that means), or saying that they realize that Axanar is better than their upcoming Star Trek Beyond film (more on that below), so they are trying to crush the competition. Hashtag campaigns have begun as has a petition over at Change.org (because, you know, this is an important manner). Other fans have decided they will boycott the upcoming Star Trek film and all other Trek-related projects to which I say, “No, you’re not.”

Peters, meanwhile, has taken to Twitter and has loudly lost his mind tweeting such statements as “Axanar is exactly what fans want” and then shaming actor Tony Todd (who was a part of Axanar before quitting a few months ago) for his comments for Peters to “tell the truth”. Additionally, Peter’s cohort Robert Meyer Burnett (director of Free Enterprise) hasn’t helped by also taking to Twitter to have a temper tantrum. I’m guessing their legal team took the day off from advising clients what to do. Many of these tweets were later deleted, but the internet is an unforgiving place where things are copied and saved.

And then Peters decided to throw a bunch of other fan films under the bus during his Twitter rant. I’m sure those people are loving that he lumped them with him.

Here is the Hitler-Dub meme that basically goes over the situation.

These fans that are defending Axanar – to they even know how copyright law works? Or how what Peters and company are doing is wrong and illegal. Maybe Peters didn’t realize what he was doing and got himself tangled in this mess. Regardless, he crossed that invisible line that CBS/Paramount set.

Paramount and CBS don’t care if a small handful of fans thing Axanar is better than Star Trek Beyond (it won’t be). Most people (and even the average Star Trek fan) don’t know that Axanar even exists or would care about it. There is absolutely no conspiracy against Star Trek fans and people who think that are deluded.

For comparison: the fan film has raised approximately 2 million dollars. Star Trek Into Darkness (which was a flop according to idiots) earned $467 million. The Star Trek Beyond teaser from Paramount’s YouTube page has had 13 millions views. The Axanar prelude off the Axanar YouTube page has a little less than 2 million.

But, clearly, despite the numbers, Axanar is what people want.

As for the actual fan film – it hasn’t been made yet. There was a “prelude” to get people interested in it (which I hate to admit that I watched due to the lawsuit). And while the short film was interesting in the fact that it was done in a documentary style, the effects were hardly up to current-day production style like they claim (it reminded me of X-Box 360 graphics – an achievement to be sure, but not what they are claiming), and the story was nothing more than a war story/battle. For some “super fans” to claim that this is what true Star Trek is seems misguided as the current film series is way more in line with the original series that this.

CBS and Paramount is absolutely in the right in defending their intellectual property. If the Axanar team didn’t do anything knowingly wrong, they wouldn’t be fanning the flames of their frothing-at-the-mouth fans. Axanar is dead. CBS/Paramount isn’t to blame. The Axanar production team is. When you don’t play ball, you don’t get to play.

 

[Potemkin_Prod]

I'd like them to give one episode to each of the Hugo / Nebula award winning writers alive, and then not muck with the results beyond a continuity guide basic conformance and budget management. But its product, not art, so that's never gonna happen.

You can never tell. Roddenberry assembled a committee of science fiction writers to help develop Star Trek. Maybe someone at CBS will take that same step. At least we can hope.

 

[Shaka Zulu]

Interstellar, The Martian and Gravity prove also that audiences will embrace thoughtful science fiction drama if it is of high quality. Hopefully CBS looks more towards those than to Guardians of the Galaxy, Star Wars and Into Darkness.

Why should they have to create a show to be like Interstellar, The Martian and Gravity when everybody knows that Star Trek is a sci-fi action-adventure show? Going back to the way it was under Berman & Braga (as well as a strict version of Roddenberry's so-called 'vision') isn't going to work anymore, the franchise's been there, and done that.

Plus, Star Trek Into Darkness has already dealt with current issues of the day (terrorism, revenge and the blowback that comes from such revenge.)-it will have to deal with something similar in the new movie and the upcoming TV series. If you or others want what was on Next Gen, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, you'll have to watch those shows. The writers have to be able to tell good stories that will work for today, not for the era of the 1980's-1990's that the later shows started in. And they also have to deal with the fact that this is space opera, not the kind of sci-fi that Interstellar, The Martian and Gravity are. People will be expecting some kind of action adventure when they watch a Star Trek show, and it might be foolish for the writers not to give it to them.

 

[E-DUB]

I regularly visit a used book sale at my local library and they constantly put those wretched "Left Behind" books in the Science Fiction. So why am I mentioning this here? Because my reaction was that the people who'd want them won't see them and the people who see them won't want them.

I have the same reaction when people want to call something "Star Trek" and then want to see something that isn't.

 

[Professor Zoom]

I regularly visit a used book sale at my local library and they constantly put those wretched "Left Behind" books in the Science Fiction. So why am I mentioning this here? Because my reaction was that the people who'd want them won't see them and the people who see them won't want them.

I have the same reaction when people want to call something "Star Trek" and then want to see something that isn't.

What IS Star Trek then?

 

[SuperSpaceMan]

No disagreement, but I don't call that a reinvention.

TNG is Star Trek to me.

Change is fine. Complete reinvention is not. It's why I can enjoy the JJ films. They're still Star Trek, just a different flavor.

But what the original poster I responded to wanted was a total ground-up reinvention.

I would like to see a reimagining, personnally.

All Star Trek, was based on what we thought 300 years in the future would look like from 50 years ago. In many ways, what we have today, technologically, surpasses what they had on Star Trek... Vast amounts of data can be carried on chips the size of my thumb... We have OLED screens.. Touch Screens....

So, lets imagine what 250 years from now will look like from today, opposed to 50 years ago.

Seriously, would you imagine landing parties having separate communicators, and tricorders? If I had to imagine today, what those things might look like, they would be all in one, maybe like an apple watch, with a holographic projecttion for an interface/screen. Heck, maybe augmented reality contacts, that could give people with regular vision, access to the full light spectrum..

 

[Mudd]

CBS knows the trekkies will watch - they'll all watch. Ninety-percent of the hardcore Trek fans in the country watched Enterprise every week on UPN until the bitter end, claimed they didn't and then bitched about the show.

CBS wants new viewers, and if they don't get them in significant numbers they'll have no trouble pulling the plug on this thing.

And none of this should be being discussed in this topic.

 

[mos6507]

I don't think an accurate prediction of the future can fit into a box that anyone would recognize as "Star Trek". I mean, even now people like Stephen Hawking are predicting that A.I. will make humans obsolete. Something akin to a Kubrick A.I. future in which humans are replaced by robots or we just upload into Matrix like simulations seems more likely than any straight continuation of biological humans. And that's just on the utopian scale, whereas most futurism these days is apocalyptic.

As such, Trek's relevance today is more as science-fantasy vs. fact. I know I'm probably in the minority on this opinion within Trek fans, but that's how I feel about it.

Trek is retro-futurism at best. Doesn't make it not worth watching, but probably no longer provides any sort of accurate prediction of where we're headed.

 

[mos6507]

A new show or movie provides new content for new products. So the show doesn't actually have to do as well as other shows like NCIS or Criminal Minds to be just as financially successful.

I've read somewhere that the Simpsons doesn't rate that well and is really only on the air by virtue of the merchandising. So that can work.